Mental patient wants to stand trial for 1986 homicide

WEST CHESTER — A former West Caln man who has spent the better part of two decades in Norristown State Hospital after being charged with the 1986 murder of a township teenager is competent to stand trial on the matter, a Common Pleas Court judge was told Friday.

Stefan Szczesniuk is aware of the case against him, has a rational and factual understanding of what a trial would entail and would be able to assist his attorney in preparing for and defending the charges against him, a psychiatrist who examined him last year testified before Senior Judge Ronald Nagle.

“At this point, he does not express any delusions or hallucinations with respect to his ability to stand trial,” Dr. Barbara Ziv told Nagle. “He understands there are serious changes against him, and he does not want to continue to be caught in the limbo that is Norristown State Hospital.”

Szczesniuk, 59, who has been committed to Norristown for at least 25 years, is accused of the November 1986 shotgun slaying of a neighbor, Raymond Alfred Yoder Jr., who was then 15 years old and a student at Coatesville Intermediate High School.

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Law enforcement authorities charged at the time that Szczesniuk irrationally believed that Yoder had been making romantic advances towards him. He had had several confrontations with the teen previously and had even called his mother and threatened him.

After his arrest in the murder case, Szczesniuk was diagnosed as suffering from delusional paranoia and schizophrenia and was sent to a forensic psychiatric ward at Norristown.

In 2000, a Common Pleas judge ruled that Szczesniuk was incompetent to stand trial and would not likely regain competence, and the judge ordered the homicide charges against him dismissed. Thereafter, Szczesniuk was held in the hospital on an involuntary civil commitment.

Ziv said she interviewed Szczesniuk at the hospital in August and found that whatever delusions he had been suffered previously had been placed under control. Under questioning from Deputy District Attorney Peter Hobart, she speculated that his decision to begin taking medication prescribed for him had helped him regain control over his paranoia, although she said he still suffers from a mental illness.

A standardized psychiatric test that she administered showed Szczesniuk had “zero” delusional characteristics and that he understood the possible outcomes of a trial or hearing and the role of a judge, a jury, and attorneys, Ziv testified. She said he told her that he was hopeful that he could plea bargain to a change that would allow him to be released with a “time served” sentence.

Szczesniuk, who works part time as a janitor at the hospital earning minimum wage and who lives in the same building at the facility as infamous killer Richard Greist, appeared in Nagle’s courtroom in handcuffs for the hearing dressed in a short-sleeved white shirt, a tie and dark slacks.

He did not address the court during the 90-minute hearing, and somewhat unusually, he did not sit at the defense table with his attorney, Lidia Aperovich of Feasterville, or communicate with her.

Aperovich, who had taken up Szczesniuk’s case last year on behalf of his family, who still lives in the Honey Brook area, told Nagle that her client had expressed to her the wish to be declared competent so that he could “move on” with his life. She said that in his best interests, she had decided to challenge the findings of Ziv and another psychiatrist, Dr. Hansa Shah, that he was now competent.

In her cross-examination of Ziv, Aperovich sparred with the prosecution psychiatrist on several counts.

Ziv had earlier stated the opinion that a delusion that would keep a person from being able to assist in his or her trial would include the belief that a judge had a chip planted in his brain that made him antagonistic towards defendants. Citing previous statements by Szczesniuk that he did not like the “hanging judges” he had appeared before in the past, Aperovich asked whether the two were not comparable.

Ziv said they were not. Although he had complained of such misgivings in the past, she said he had expressed no animus towards Nagle. Besides, she noted, “there are plenty of people who walk through these doors who wonder if they are going to get a fair shake” from a judge.

Aperovich also questioned how Szczesniuk could understand the case against him when he said he was charged with simple assault as well as homicide. Ziv said minor misunderstandings about which crimes he faced did not reflect on his ability to understand. “This isn’t an SAT test, where you need to get everything right down to the letter,” she said.

Finally, the attorney challenged whether Szczesniuk’s hope that he could be released with a ‘time served’ sentence for such a serious crime showed that he was still being delusional. Ziv said she had spoken with him about the various outcomes of a trial would be, and that he understood that a life sentence was a possibility.

But regardless, she said, whether he had a realistic idea of what might befall him was not the question. “It is irrelevant as to his competency to stand trial,” she told Aperovich.

Nagle did not issue a ruling from the bench Friday but is expected to do so soon. If he finds that Szczesniuk is indeed competent to stand trial, Szczesniuk would then likely be returned to Chester County Prison. Because the homicide charges against Szczesniuk had been dismissed in 2000, it is unclear whether the judicial process would start anew.

Deputy District Attorney Thomas Ost-Prisco has been assigned to handle the case if it is listed for trial.